The Financial Struggles and Academic Performance of Senior High School

in Grade 11-12 Home Economics Strand in

Pontevedra National High School

Chapter 1
Introduction

Background of The Study

The concept of academic performance has become a source of concern to

researchers, especially as the academic performance of the students is declining.

Academic performance is defined or regarded as participants ‘examination grades

at the end of a given duration (term, semester, and programme). It could also be

seen as the level of performance in a particular field of study. Higher scores

indicate better academic performance.

In an academic institution, these basic needs go beyond food, shelter,

clothing and energy. In addition to these four, the basic needs of a student extend

to the cost of transportation, health care, stationary and more recently, the

information and communication technology. Many students have been finding it

difficult feeding themselves because they lack enough money to do so. The school

cafeterias that impact of students’ financial strength on their Academic

Performance are supposed to serve at subsidized rates are no more functioning.

Even students who usually bring their foodstuff need money for ingredients,

kerosene, etc.
 Financial literacy has become one of the most concerned issues in the

developed countries in recent years especially after the economic crisis of 2008

since the effects of personal finance are significant to societies. Prior to the

economic crisis of 2008, studies on financial literacy were scarce in academic

journals, but governments of many developed countries however gave the needed

attention to the issue of financial literacy after the crisis. For instance, there was an

advisory committee on personal finance which was put in place to encourage

financial literacy awareness among Americans after the economic crisis. The idea

of personal finance has been described in the literature as the awareness and use of

financial knowledge in our day to day economic activities. It is therefore the

application of financial knowledge and terminologies by individuals in order to

make a rational decision. Many academic researchers in the field of personal

finance have chosen to define the concept as “the ability to make informed and

efficient judgment regarding the use and management of money (Schagen and

lines, 1996). Personal finance literacy is however conceptualized on certain critical

areas in finance such as savings and borrowing, interest rate, budgeting and

financial knowledge (Chen and volpe, 1998; Remund, 2010). Past Studies have

revealed that Americans tend to have a higher rate of consumption compared to

their savings rate. This consequently led the country into a total negative savings

rate (Sullivaa et al, 2008). This then calls for the need for United States
government to inculcate financial literacy among Americans and thus explains why

educators, policy makers and 2 university officials have paid much attention to

college student‟s financial behavior in recent times. For instance, several empirical

researches have been conducted on use of credit cards by college students and the

results are that college students tend to accrue a significant amount of debts which

put them at greater risk for financial problems after graduation (Allen and Jover,

1997).The need for financial literacy becomes inevitable since today‟s world

markets are full of complicated products. Considering the spending habit of people

and the desire to have every material thing, it is therefore imperative to inculcate

financial literacy among people. Senior high school and college students in recent

times tend to have easy access to funds, but on the contrary have proven to have

inadequate financial literacy and as a result have become impulsive buyers (Danes,

Huddleston and Boyce, 1999). The inadequate personal finance among Senior

High School students then has undesirable effects on students‟ decision making.

The issue of personal finance therefore must be given the needed attention as

students would be facing the realities of economic hardships after school. This

implies that there is the need for senior high students to be equipped with financial

literacy in order to achieve some degree of financial autonomy. Several researches

conducted globally to measure financial literacy among adults have proven that

adults tend to exhibit insufficient level of financial literacy. A large number of the
research however focus on gender as an essential characteristic of financial literacy

and have documented a persistent gender gap (Hanna, Hill, and Perdue, 2010).The

level of financial literacy therefore varies among gender as males tend to have

understanding and ability to apply financial concepts in their financial decision

compared to females. Senior high school students in Ghana are not exposed to

basic personal finance literacy before completion as the school curriculum places

emphasis on getting admission to tertiary institutions rather than inculcating

financial 3 literacy such as money management, investments, mutual funds,

insurance and taxes into the syllabus. “As the world faces further economic

uncertainty, it is important that we equip our children with the financial literacy

skills they need to make wise decision about how they spend and save their

money.” Simon Martin, Head of Group Corporate Sustainability at HSBC .

Statement Of The Problem

The study aims to identify how the financial struggles effect the academic

performance of the Senior High School in Pontevedra National High School.

This specifically aims to answer the following questions:

1. What is the profile of the respondents in terms of:

1.1 Age;

1.2 Occupation of Parents;

1.3 Gender; and

 1.4 Educational Background of Parents?

2. What is the financial status of the respondents in terms of:

2.1 Educational Attainment of Parents;

2.2 Occupation/Kind of Work of Parents; and

2.3 Monthly Income?

3. What is the academic performance of the respondents?

4. Is there a significant effect between the financial status and academic

performance of the respondents?

Statement of Hypothesis

Ho: There is no significant effect between the financial struggle and

academic performance of the respondent.

Significance Of The Study

Students -The study may helpful for senior high student. It helps the Senior

High student to design and implement the policies to improve the students’

performance and the quality of education by changing the attitude of students

towards learning, facilitating students and improving the teaching procedures. To

increase their knowledge about financial struggles in academic performance of a

student. In this way they get an idea and how to deal with their financial problems.
They will also know how to avoid them from financial problems. it is important

that they know what the impact of financial problem in academic performance.

Parents - Can use the outcomes of the study to solve the students’ problems

especially financial problems and to look after them. It may also create awareness

among students about their rights and responsibilities to achieve quality education.

after them. It may also create awareness among students about their rights and

responsibilities to achieve quality education. In this research they will know their

impact on their children if they experience financial problems in their studies

Scope and Delimination

The focus of this study is to conduct an empirical overview of financial

struggles in academic performance among Senior High School students. This study

however focuses on some selected Senior High School in Pontevedra National

High School.

This study covers only One hundred sixty three (163) respondents from

Senior High School of Pontevedra National High School SY. 2019-2020.

 CHAPTER II

REVIEW RELATED LITERATURE

This chapter does a review on relevant literature from articles, journals, books and publication on

financial struggles in academic performances among Senior High Students.

Financial Status and Academic Performance

The financial status or the social economics status is most commonly determine by

combining parent’s education level, occupational status and the income level (Jeynes,2002;

McMillan & Western, 200). In most of the studies done on academic performance of students, it

is not surprising that financial status is one of the major factor studied while predicting academic

performance. It is believe that low financial status negatively effects academic achievement

because lesser financial status prevents access to vital resources and creates additional stress at

home (Eamon 2005;Jeynes, 2002). Graetz (1995) carried out a study on economic background

remains one of the major sources of educational inequality and adds that one’s educational

success depends very strongly on the financial status of the parents.

The individual’s educational achievement has a basic foundation on the early stage of

his/her growth and development, the pre-educational stage involve infancy and childhood, and

their health and hygiene and the constituent of their nutrition determines greatly the rate of

growth and mental development in them. This is because each child is endowed with different

genetic potential being modified by their environment. This makes any child unique in his/her

makeup which is a concept of individual difference. (Mallum, Huggai and Ajaegbu,

2014). Ballantine (1983) demonstrated that socioeconomic and educational background of

the parent goes a long way in determining child’s academic achievement. This is a reality,

because the parent educational background and level of income places the child in a better

position in terms of academics and other extra-curricular achievement thus, the saying “the better

the socio economic background, the higher the expectation

both physically and mentally (academically)”.

Expenditure on education does not only directly improve people’s lives and well being

but also contributes indirectly as a stock that contributes to increase in national income.

Education equips people with literary and numeracy and directly improves their

productively (Ukwu, 2002). This assertion reinforces the fundamentality of education to

the quest for national development in any country. The Nigerian educational policy, even

with its lofty visions, would remain mere documentations unless the education sector in

Nigeria is well funded and professionally managed. Udoh and Akpa (2004) noted that,

financing education is as popular as it is a true domain of economist. They further explain

that educators decide what is to be done and then, the economist work out how much

the cost would be and how to source for money for the implementation of such

educational program.

Woolfolk (2004) supports by arguing that because low socioeconomic status students

may wear old clothes, speak in dialect or be less familiar with books and school activities,

teachers and other students may assume that those students are not bright and teachers

may avoid calling them to answer questions in the classroom to protect them from

embarrassment of giving wrong responses. This makes these students less attentive and do
not concentrate on what is being taught, and in the end, they come to believe that they

are not very good at schoolwork. This situation makes them perform poorly in the

subjects and sometimes drop out from school because they are affected psychologically.

Many empirical studies on personal finance literacy tend to center on high school

students. Danes and Hira (1987) are the first scholars to undertake academic work on financial

literacy on senior high school students. Avard et al. (2005) reveals that graduates from high

schools lack the understanding of basic personal finance issues. This emphasizes that most

students find it difficult to balance a checkbook and lack the basic principles in finance (Avard,

Manton, English and Walker, 2005). Another academic work conducted by A National Council

on Economic Education study (2005) indicates that 53 per cent of senior high students performed

woefully on the basic quiz on economics and personal finance in the United States. This stresses

that there is inadequate personal finance among senior high students and that have had a

negative effect on their financial decisions and behavior. High school students therefore leave

school without the basic skills to manage their personal financial affairs, putting them at a high

risk for not being able to plan responsibly for their financial future. The ability of senior high

school students to deal with financial difficulties is dependent on financial exposure gained

before entering college (Lyons, Scherpf, and Roberts, 2006).

Synthesis

Research shows that financial is one of the major factor studied while predicting

academic performance. It is believe that low financial status negatively effects academic

achievement because lesser financial status prevents access to vital resources and creates

additional stress at home (Eamon 2005;Jeynes, 2002). Graetz (1995) carried out a study on
economic background remains one of the major sources of educational inequality and adds that

one’s educational success depends very strongly on the financial status of the parents.

Further studies involve loans, money and stress. There is more to it. Some even take

advantages from students from such reason. Even so, there are so many ways or steps to make it

less stressful. Several empirical studies have proven that large number of senior high students

borrows to finance their senior high education and as a result they tend to accrue a significant

amount of debts which put them at greater risk for financial problems after graduation (Allen and

Jover, 1997).

Money Management can help them to avoid stress and financial problems and not be able

to commit to financial struggles. Money management is a concept that explains how financial

assets are managed. Money management encompasses critical areas in finance like investment,

budgeting, banking and taxes. It is therefore a strategy used to ensure that investment assets yield

the highest interest value. Researchers suggested that student must be able to have their own skill

to save money. According to warneryd (1999), saving is defined as the variation between net

worth at the end of the period and the net worth at the beginning of the period which should

equal the excess of income over consumption expenditure in the same period. Savings is

therefore explained as money or physical assets allocated for future use.

Based on the conclusion of financial problem among student are they have many problem by the

student. They can’t take it slightly about this problems. They still have to find solution so that

they won’t regret in future. students also must take an example of other effected students who

had gone threw money problem as a lesson. In conclusion, students must have ability to plan

their money to avoid financial problems from occurring. Hence, the present study wanted to
determine that if financial struggles affect the academic performance of students specifically, the

senior high school students.

CHAPTER III

METHODOLOGY

This chapter elaborates the methods and procedures that were used during the conduct of

the study. This includes the research design, locale of the study, participants of the study, sample

size and sampling techniques, research instruments, data gathering procedure, and data analysis

procedure.

Research Design

This research utilized descriptive designs to find out if there is a relationship between

financial struggles in academic performance of a student. the researcher tries to establish the

relationship between certain demographic factor such as academic course, age, gender,family

background and financial problem.. Secondly, the research design enables the researcher to

examine how the students‟ level of personal finance affects their opinions and decisions. This

study therefore uses exploratory method as it enables the researcher to find out how students

understand and apply personal finance. The research strategy employed for this study is the

survey strategy which allows an efficient way to gather the needed information from the

population of the study. Survey strategy is usually used for exploratory and explanatory research

as it establishes reasons for relationships between variables. Survey strategy uses questionnaire
in collecting the data and also allows the researcher to analyze the data quantitatively using

descriptive and inferential statistics. This study then uses the quantitative approach in analyzing

the data. Quantitative approach is used for data collection technique that uses numerical data. It

therefore employs questionnaire, graphs or statistics in its analysis.

Locale of the Study

The study was conducted in one of the public senior high schools in HE strand in a municipality

in the province of Capiz during school year 2019-2020.

Sampling Size and Sampling Techniques

To determine the sample size, the standard formula (Slovin’s Formula) was used with margin of

error at 0.05. Simple random sampling was used to select the participant.

Participants of the Study

The participants of this study were 18 randomly selected students from the population of 163

HE strands students in a public senior high school.

Research Instruments

The study utilized research instruments developed by the researchers. There were two

instruments used in a study to determine the relationship between financial struggles in

academic performance of Senior High School in Grade 11-12 Home Economics students.
 The first instrument is a 1 to 3 items test about their family background and to determine

how much money or income goes to them every month and how much they can afford during

the school week.

The second instrument was a 10 item test used here we can find out if they are experiencing

so-called financial struggles and whether their academic performance is affected by financial.

To be chosen by Always, often,sometimes,seldom and never.

A. Table 1. Please answer the following Question.

1. How much the income of your mother per month?

3,000/5,000 5,000/10,000 10,000/15,000 20,000 above

2. How much the income of your father per month?

3,000/5,000 5,000/10,000 10,000/15,000 20,000 above

3. How much is your allowance for a week?

300 a week 500 a week 800 a week 1,000 above

B. Table 2. Direction please indicate your responses on the following items by putting a
check (√) in the blank.

Please rate your actualities you performed using the following scale:
5 - Always
4 - Often
3 - Sometimes
2 - Seldom
1 - Never

STATEMENTS 5 4 3 2 1
1. I past my project on time.
2. I pay for my school fees.

3. I paid for my miscellaneus twice

when the exam was coming up.
4. I donate money to print,
photocopy, etc. for school works.
5. I rode transportation to school as
well as on my way home.
6. I can buy the things I want and
need at school.
7. I borrowed money from my
classmates.
8.

Validity and Reliability of the Research Instrument

Refferences

https://www.academia.edu/16591981/Financial_Status_and_Academic_Performance

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/284551946_THE_IMPACT_OF_FINANCE_ON_THE_ACADEMI

C_PERFORMANCE_OF_SECONDARY_SCHOOL_STUDENTS_IN_AKWANGA_LOCAL_GOVERNMENT_OF_NA

SSARAWA_STATE_NIGERIA